OWN CORRESPONDENT, Harare | Friday 11.00am.
CHENJERAI Hunzvi, the leader of Zimbabwe’s militant liberation war veterans, appeared in court on Friday to argue that he had taken “tremendous steps” to end the violent seizures of white-owned farms by his followers.
The Commercial Farmers Union (CFU), which represents most of Zimbabwe’s 4000 white commercial farmers, brought a court case against Hunzvi for contempt of a High Court ruling ordering the squatters to leave the farms.
Hunzvi was found guilty last month of contempt of the court order and was told to provide proof he had tried to solve the land problem without violence or face a jail sentence.
At the start of Friday’s hearing, CFU lawyer Firoz Girach told justice David Bartlett that the CFU believed the safety of farmers was of paramount importance.
The war veterans and the CFU have been involved in dialogue to end the farm invasions. Last week they set up a land commission tasked with identifying and redistributing land from whites to landless blacks.
Hunzvi told reporters before the hearing that he was confident of a courtroom victory.
But he added, “What happens happens, if I am jailed I am jailed.”
Unlike during a previous court appearance, there were no crowds of war veterans demonstrating in support of Hunzvi outside the court on Friday.
Hunzvi and his war veterans have led the invasion of more than 1300 white-owned farms since February, when voters rejected a constitutional amendment that would have empowered the government to seize white-owned farmlands without compensation.
The invasions have at times turned violent resulting in the killing of four white farmers and a black police man. — AFP
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